A Season of Understanding
by Hamstadini
Summary: A Christmas K7 WAFF PWP (Insert other acronyms here :-P) fic


Title: A Season of Understanding: An Unexpected Encounter  
Author: Nathan Yuen  
Email:  
Rating: PG  
Parts: 1/4  
Pairing: K/7, Libby, EMH, J/C  
Genre: Romantic, Drama, Spiritual  
Setting: One of those J/C universes where Chakotay and Seven break it off, and while Chakotay reacquaints himself with the Admiral Seven is left to mope in a lab.  
Summary: While on shore leave, Harry meets up with Libby and finds out that Seven's not doing so well on her own.  
Disclaimer: None of these guys belong to me. I'm just using them to channel my muse and take me to where no one has gone before, so hopefully Paramount won't be too displeased when I return their favorite characters to them after I borrow them.  
Author's Prescript:  
Character Warnings: there is a lot of Libby cuteness in the first half of the chapter. I didn't know what her character was like, and I was really too lazy to look it up in either "Non Sequitor" or the Homecoming series, so I wrote how she might look when she was glad to see Harry. Don't worry, I took good care of her.  
If you're a K/7er, that's cool. If you're a Doc hater, look somewhere else. While I can't write D/7, I feel that he'd make a loyal friend of Seven's and that his intentions are entirely honorable, if misguided at times. So I wrote him as such. If you don't like what I write, go write some anti-doc fic and blow off some steam, 'cause you won't see any here.  
Italics explanations: If there are italics, it means it's a direct character thought. If it's in italics and quotes, then it means that it was something said in the past. Yeah, I'm confused why I did that too. Just go along with it,  
Content Warnings: A couple of swear words, nothing the kids haven't heard before on CSI.

Chapter 1: An unexpected encounter.

_Tycho City is so beautiful when it snows,_ Harry thought as he stepped off the transporter platform and regarded the lunar city's skyline, _it's a pity I can't stay longer_.

Hefting the durable plastic shopping bag by the handle and making sure he wore the proper covering against the cold, he stepped out into the street. While children played in the lightly packed frost, he strolled along step by step, smiling warmly at the act of charity that they were given. Normally the staff at atmospheric control gave the city a balmy temperature and moisture, but during the winter months of the Terran Northern Hemisphere they chilled the weather a bit, and if they were feeling particularly festive, they would give the citizens a light flurry and call it a snow day for the kids.

Remembering the time he quickened his pace, reveling in crunching the fresh snow underfoot and fluidly sliding his way through the oncoming crowd. For the first time in the two years that he served on the _Titan_ as chief ops officer he was within transporter range of Earth and its lunar satellite, and he had promised to see his ex-fiancé Libby as soon as possible; it was a tradition of sorts for them to meet and exchange gifts every year. He even forgot to change out of his uniform, so quick he was to the transporter padd.

Soon he made it to the skyscraper where they were to meet. Inside, the hall was packed with flowing groups of humans and aliens coming and going, their steps thundering around the grand tiled ceiling and marbled halls. Everything had a warm, royal glow about it, and in the air pervaded a sense of easygoing laxness. _Must be the holiday spirit_, Harry thought warmly.

Despite the size of the hall, it took very little effort for Harry to find Libby, who was peering at the little trinkets so prominently displayed at one of the kiosks installed inside. A few seconds later Libby spotted him and ran the empty distance that separated them, her shoes clacking loudly on the lacquered granite floor. She tackled him with a hug, and for a few moments nothing needed to be said.

The moment passed and Harry released her. "Still fond of those chibi dolls I see," he chuckled, referring to the items shown at the kiosk,

Gracefully brushing a lock of long brown hair out of her face, Libby said in a mock huff, "I'm not the only one. Danny may say different, but he's grown to having them around the place." Her smile suddenly shrank at the unwelcome change of subject, but Harry's smile remained steadfast.

Danny Bird, Harry's best friend in the Academy, simultaneously grieved with and comforted Libby when they heard that Voyager was lost in the Badlands. Their shared pain built a stronger bond between them, and three years later they joyfully married. Though Harry didn't begrudge the couple – he'd even felt honored that they waited so long for him to return before moving on, and happy that they found love in each other – Danny demurred to talk to Harry every time, declaring that it felt "awkward to talk to my wife's former fiancée, and a friend I thought was dead." So it was no surprise when Danny refused the invitation that Harry sent along through Libby, through Danny told Libby to send Harry his best wishes.

Libby brought herself back to reality and chuckled demurely. "They even made chibi dolls of the Voyager crew. You should see yours; they got you perfectly, down to all the FAT you gained around your middle." She poked him in his (somewhat lean) midsection.

"Ow! Hey, since when did you earn the right to abuse me!?" Harry cried, fending off her other arm.

"Since you decided to scare the dickens out of me by coming back from the dead, silly!" She laughed.

"Keep that up, and you won't get your present…" Harry waggled a finger at her mockingly.

"Present? Oh, let me see!" She made a halfhearted attempt to swipe the bag he was carrying.

Harry gave her a stern glance, though his chest warmed happily. Libby was normally serious; rarely did she ever let her inner child loose like this especially in public. She _must_ be glad to see him. He lifted the bag, which contained a couple of boxed gifts that he'd bought from some more exotic locales. As he dropped the bag handle squarely into her palm he declared "and this time you _won't_ be able to open them before Christmas day. I installed a generator in each of them that emits a modulating force field under the wrappers that won't deactivate until December 25th at 0600 hours."

Libby's eyes glittered with amusement while she handed him his gift in a similar bag. "You went to all this trouble to keep me out? I'm flattered."

"Anything to keep my one time fiancé from trouble," he said half-jokingly.

Her smile frozen on her face, Libby asked, "You want to get a cup of coffee?"

Harry was about to reply when he felt something tug at his consciousness.

Other than the bizarre events happening in his life, Harry was an ordinary human despite his desire to be something more. But even humans have some sense of extrasensory perception. Perhaps Harry's subconscious registered a shock of blonde hair in his peripheral vision, or a metal-capped hand. Maybe among the general clatter of humanoids walking he heard the familiar tattoo of high heels, among the voices one distinctive, imperious, and strangely seductive low woman's voice.

But no matter what the trigger or the cause, he knew that Seven of Nine was nearby.

Libby, having known Harry for many years, caught the swift change of mood instantaneously. "Harry, what's wrong?" She asked worriedly.

The bag dropped to his side, forgotten, and he looked around, searching. "Do you see her?" "See who?" "She's got blonde hair, tall, rigid gait…" "I don't see anyone…"

Harry spotted her retreating back beginning to blend in among the bustling crowd. Even though he didn't see her face and she seemed to be wearing a thin white overshirt of some sort, a hunch screamed in his mind "It's her!" His mind was left behind as his body rushed forward at the undeniable command to get to the woman. "Seven!" He yelled.

She halted and turned, one familiar individual among a crowd of thousands, and yet so different to his familiar eye. Harry skidded to a stop right in front of her, forgetting a thousand things that he had prepared to say, been meaning to say if they ever chanced to meet again. All he could do is stop and gaze at her.

Hollow eyes returned the gaze, flickered once to his collar of rank, then back to his face. "Lieutenant," she said dully, by way of greeting.

"Hi, Seven. Almost lost you in the crowd," he said. _Like a ghost_, he added silently. "It's great to see you again! I, uh, haven't seen you in a while," he continued, gamely keeping up a grin, "not since…" His smile shrank noticeably, recalling the last time he saw her.

"Not since Voyager returned to Earth," she finished for him. "Not since Captain Chakotay and I announced our romantic affiliation to the crew."

"Yeah, that's it!" Harry's grin renewed itself with false enthusiasm, trying to inject some life into the conversation. His distaste for the memory struggled valiantly to get out and express itself. "How are you anyways? What're you doing on Tycho City?"

"I am functioning adequately. I am doing research here. It is proving fruitful." Her eyes, once a clear sky blue, now dully reflected stone grey irises. The clipped phrases sounded rehearsed and it was obvious that she wasn't even putting her soul into the conversation. It was as painful as pulling teeth, and Harry fought the urge to run away.

"Hey Seven… you look like you're exhausted. Me and a friend are gonna take a load off, get some coffee. Would you like to join us?" He prayed that his voice only reflected the tones of a concerned comrade and not that of an eager romantic, and hoped that the thundering in his ears was not his heart but the bustle of the crowd around them.

The offer seemed to shake Seven out of whatever reverie she was in for an instant. But then her eyes flickered to look at someone behind Harry, and then the stone eyes turned back to him. "I am very busy, Lieutenant. I apologize, but I must decline your offer. Farewell," she said mechanically, and then before he could reply she vanished among the crowd.

Lost in his troubled thoughts, Harry turned away. _She seemed so… empty,_ he thought. It was not an emptiness brought on by a mechanical collective will, no, even then she was vivacious even if it was detrimental to the crew of Voyager. This was the emptiness brought on by fresh despair. The death of family, perhaps? The only family he knew she had was her aunt, Ira or Irene –

"So that's her?" The question, said with forced casualness, brought Harry back to the present and he found himself looking into Libby's pained eyes. "She's the one that you fell for on Voyager, isn't it?"

Harry was immediately on the defensive. "No Libby, it's –" Then he forced himself to relax. How could he lie to her? Better to tell the truth now than to suffer consequences later. He put his hands on her arms and looked deeply into her eyes, reigniting a trust that had been dormant for nine years. "It never became anything like that. Yeah, she was beautiful and smart and different and she had a rogue charm about her, but I never really was good enough for her. She turned to the others, like the captain, for advice, and I was just another colleague. Well, I consider her a friend to me, but I don't know if the feeling's mutual."

Libby quietly nodded once, then a couple more times in quick succession ending with a blooming smile. "So, you want to get that coffee?" She queried.

"Sorry Lib, but I gotta take a rain check on that." Her smile took a sad turn. He tried not to notice it as he picked up her bag. "Yeah, I know," She said, recovering, "But it was worth a shot. Go do what you do best," She slapped him on the arm, " and cheer her up."

Despite her trepidations, Seven made her way into the turbolift. It was necessary to put as much distance as she could from the site of the encounter. Unfortunately, the turbolift was empty; she needed a distraction in there, some person or object to keep her from remembering. She needed to keep moving, needed to distract herself, or else she would start thinking about her time on Voyager, then about them, and then about him…

_"Annika, I need to tell you something…" _

Ever since _that_ moment in time, she had been on the run from her past, from her memories and the pain hidden there. Moving to Tycho City and getting an assignment to reviewing previous years stellar cartography reports was a simple matter, and from then on she resolutely threw herself into the mind numbing work. Day after day she toiled at a computer console in a sterile office; no human interaction was necessary there. In her life, no human communication was necessary – only the distraction of algorithms. Numbers were certain, concrete; they do not change allegiances, like how he did…

How he broke her heart…

_… I think we've been living a lie… _

Sometimes she considered committing suicide or finding a way to rejoin the collective. Could death or assimilation be any inferior to an existence of emotionless living? But no, she could not do that. A will to preserve, a will to live stalled her hand. Death or assimilation caused only pain to others, and she would not commit so cruel an act. So she simply continued to exist.

She lived the lie, and was now living a truth that was so much worse…

The turbolift thrummed, continuing her ascent up to oblivion.

A couple of hours later, Harry strolled into the same turbolift, hoping he was prepared for whatever came his way in the next five minutes.

He cursed himself for his selfish ignorance. After that fateful party where Seven and Chakotay announced their relationship, he took flight in shock and jealousy. After saying a hasty good bye to his longtime friends B'elanna and Tom, he quickly packed his things and took the next assignment he was given, which was the _Titan_. Aside from the Paris', with whom he talked to only occasionally, he cut off all communications with everyone else.

He was surprised at how much depth of feeling remained for Seven, how much pain it had caused him when he heard the announcement. He thought he had left that behind, buried beneath his unsuccessful attempts at winning Megan Delany over and his flash romance with Tal. But no, the feelings were still there and caught him off guard when they exploded inside him. Now, he was paying the price by not knowing what was going on in Seven's life, and she was paying the price, too, by living in emotional torture.

So, he had needed someone to fill in the blanks. Someone who was close enough to Seven to know what was going on inside her head, and someone who can fill in the past two years for Harry in a simple telling. He didn't think he could talk to Captain Chakotay yet (besides, how would Harry find him?), so he had went to the nearest terminal and paged the one person that could fit all the criterion and was easily found: the Doctor, Voyager's Emergency Medical Hologram, now working at Starfleet Medical.

The Doctor's firm face flashed into view after the Federation icon disappeared. _"Lieutenant Kim,"_ He had said, _"What a surprise. I hope you've been feeling well lately?" _

Harry smiled at the welcome visage, a smile tempered with concern. _"I'm fine, Doc. But I'm not the patient you should be worried about." _

"Oh?"

"I just ran into Seven, here at Tycho City. She looked so… empty when I saw her. I was wondering if you knew if the cause happened in the past two years?"

The Doc had leaned forward, his face expressing something between outrage and panic, his voice automatically hissing a near whisper. _"Lieutenant, you're asking me to violate doctor-patient confidentiality! She'll –" _

Harry hand rose to interrupt the doctor. _"Doc, I know you feel protective of her as her doctor and her friend. Believe me, I know the feeling. But I swear to you, I only have the best of intentions for her. It doesn't look like she can deal with this on her own. I want to help. But in order to help her, I need to know what's going on. And for that, I need _your_ help." _

The Doctor leaned back in his chair, rocking it back and forth as if weighing the pros and cons of such an agreement. Harry felt a swell of pride for the doctor; underneath that uncouth manner of his laid a compassionate and loyal friend. Seven was lucky to have such a confidante. _"Well, I suppose it wouldn't do any harm,"_ The doctor had said finally, _"You certainly can't do any worse than I have." _

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, she's become almost reclusive. I've tracked her, tried to talk to her and find a way to get her to recover, but it's been really difficult –" He paused. _"I'm getting ahead of myself,"_ He said apologetically. _"I will try to tell you simply the facts of the matter, not my personal opinion. In return, I want you to promise me not to interpret the facts until you confront Seven. I think it's the only way to reach her." _

"I promise," Harry swore.

Then the Doc began telling him from beginning to end what Seven did in the past two years, which surprisingly hadn't amounted to much. After the Doc finished the story, Harry nodded once, said, _"Thanks, Doc."_ And was about to close the link when the doctor raised a finger, stalling him.

_"Just one question,"_ The Doc had asked, _"What makes you think you'll do better than anyone else who tried?" _

"Simple," Harry had said with a confident grin, _"I have the element of surprise." _

After closing the link with the doctor, he looked Seven up in the directory. She had made it particularly hard for her to be found; when he couldn't find her in the public database, he switched over to Starfleet and found her registered in Tycho's Stellar Cartography Division, where he found her address under an encrypted code labeled "Contact only if necessary." Harry decoded the address; though Starfleet respects privacy, he wasn't going to let Seven go under that easily.

The turbolift shuddered to a halt, and Harry stepped out. _I'm only doing this as a friend helping another,_ he told himself. He took a deep breath and hoped he had enough wits for the conversation ahead and that surprise was enough to get him through the door.

The chime at the door startled Seven awake. For a second she didn't know where she was, though her surroundings seemed familiar enough, and the soft music playing seemed appealing. It was only when she raised her head off the metal desk that she realized with some embarrassment that she fell asleep while reading her Stellar Cartography padd. Apparently she was unconscious with her mouth open, for saliva had pooled on its touchscreen. With disgust, she shook the padd over the floor, letting the thin liquid dribble onto the carpet.

Another chime, more insistent this time, brought a more immediate problem to her attention. She strode to the door, tossing the padd on a table as she went, annoyed that someone would disturb her. Running a quick probability assessment she concluded that the Doctor was most likely to be at the door, requesting her presence at the seasonal celebration designated as "Christmas party." His persistent attempts to induce a behavioral adjustment within her, or in his words, "cheer her up" were increasingly aggravating. Though she felt indebted to him for his assistance in removing the majority of her borg implants, social pleasantries were no longer relevant if they caused her emotional pain.

She considered the possibility of Lieutenant Kim at the door, and then dismissed it. Though the encounter with him in the lobby was unexpected, judging by the company that he was keeping – Libby, his fiancé – he was most likely occupied for the remainder of the night. She suddenly realized that at that thought an unpleasant expression known as a "sneer" had formed upon her face, and she endeavored to relax her face into a neutral expression.

One part of her suggested her to keep the door closed, to let the Doctor ring until he tired, or to express stridently through the door her disapproval of his meeting her without communicating it to her first. But upon further thought she concluded that his persistence would mentally wear her down and she would be forced to invite him in regardless, and it would show a lack of respect for all the time and effort the Doctor went through in order to teach her the social graces. It was also very inefficient; the efficient course of action being to tell him in person that under no circumstances would she go to the social gathering.

Having thought this all through in milliseconds, Seven opened the door and could not contain her surprise at who was actually there. All she could state was, "Lieutenant Kim."

Harry was also taken aback, but not by who was behind the door, but what a state she was in. She looked like she just got up; her usual tidy French twist looked more like a bird's nest, and her white overshirt, which appeared to be some type of lab coat, was in wrinkles. The hollow eyes and the bags under them clearly showed strain. He forced an easygoing grin. "Hey, Seven, may I come in?"

As he predicted, Seven reverted to protocol- in this case the social graces the doctor had trained her in- when faced with an unexpected situation. "You may," she said automatically, surprising herself. He strode in before she could change her mind.

"Would… you like a refreshment, Lieutenant?" Harry nodded; he knew she was using the social nicety to buy some time, to get acclimated to his presence, rather than meaning it as a true gesture of courtesy. That was okay by Harry; it gave him time to strategize and to see what kind of environment she had been living in.

As she went into the next room, he took the time to peer around the place. He noticed that soft piano music was piping in from invisible speakers as a low mournful woman's voice began to sing.

As I sit and watch the snow  
Fallin' down  
I don't miss you at all  
I hear children playin' laughin' so loud  
I don't think of your smile

The first things he noticed were the walls. They were white and bare, not a decoration on them, not artwork or picture, nothing to show a preference of what she liked or disliked. And no reminder of Chakotay.

So if you never come to me  
You'll stay a distant memory  
Out my window I see lights going dark  
Your dark eyes don't haunt me

A table set by the couch, supposedly a coffee table, was bare; no flowers or books, just a padd that didn't seem like it had sat there for very long. There was a thick layer of dust on it, showing that it hadn't been cleaned or used. Harry was astonished that dust even existed at all; atmospheric scrubbers should have picked up all but the finest particles, and those should have been shaken off to the floor when items were placed on it. It was a tragic statement to the idleness of the table.

And then I wonder who I am  
Without the warm touch of your hand

He picked up the padd, momentarily caught off guard by the moisture on it. _Looks like someone needed some shuteye,_ he thought ruefully, _or simply needed a chew toy for a couple of hours._ He guessed the former; he had fallen asleep on a couple of particularly boring padds while he was in college. Then he skimmed it, and discovered with disgust _why_ she fell asleep on it. _Last year's stellar cartography reports?_ He thought incrediculously, _She's got way more talent than this. She should be _inventing _the next wave of astronomical equipment, not reviewing the data recorded by these relics. _

And then I wonder who I am  
Without the warm touch of your hand  
As I sit and watch the snow  
Fallin' down

He replaced the padd as gently and as precisely as he could and checked his surroundings again. For a second he wondered why the room intimidated him, and then he had the answer. The room was white, it lacked any decoration and any indication that Seven lived here; in fact, there was no evidence to prove that anybody lived here. The absence of memorabilia of Seven's time aboard Voyager implied that she didn't want to remember the time there or the time after. In other words, Seven had no past, no future; simply the present, which plodded on in her daily existence. It was a perfect system to wipe away the pain of being an individual; the closest she could get to being in a borg alcove without being in the collective. _A borg cubicle_, Harry thought succinctly. He could not help but think that he was in some part responsible for this; had he not run away and hid, had he weathered the pain of jealousy, he would have been able to help her through that dark time, aided her recover, made her happy. But now she was in seclusion, in agonizing pain, and it was his fault.

I don't miss you at all  
I don't miss you at all  
I don't miss you at all

Harry settled in on the couch just as the music started to fade. Then Seven came in with a glass of water and placed it on the coffee table, vibrating all the fine white grains of dust from the table to the floor. Rather than sit by him, she dragged in a wire metal chair from another room and sat in it to his left. "Thanks," he said, indicating the water as he took a sip.

Without preamble, Seven ordered in a flat tone, "state your purpose."

"Why Seven, I thought you knew that already. I came to see how you were doing," he said pleasantly.

Looking like she wanted to get this over with and continue with her seclusion, Seven said. "As I told you before, I am functioning adequately."

Harry decided it was time to catch her off guard with a blunt statement. "Really? Then why do you look like you're still in shock from having your arms and legs torn off by a traechean beast?"

"A subjective conclusion based on my outward appearance," Seven replied looking irked. To Harry it was a good sign; at least she was feeling something. It's too bad that her responses were irritating him in return.

Harry leaned forward like a predator about to kill, eager for some answers. "'Subjective,' you say? Oh, you want hard evidence? Then try this on for size – for half a year after Voyager's return, you were living with the commander. Then a year and a half ago, you suddenly move here to Tycho city, reviewing reports for the Lunar Observatory, pulling 19 hour shifts 340 days a year. When the Doctor finally forced you to take a break, you spent it all in this room – which to my 'subjective' eye, doesn't seem to have any vacation value at all."

Seven dismissed the evidence with an offhand shrug. "An irrelevant assessment. In those two years, I have grown to be a better individual, independent of others."

"Grown? Independent?" Harry stifled a mirthless laugh. "I don't think so, Seven. You're more borg-like now than you have ever been. Oh sure, you think you're better now, but I remember the old Seven. The one whom I traded jokes with on the Delta Flyer, the one who wasn't afraid to give me her blunt advice on the Nightingale, the one who showed compassion by trying to give me her three minutes of communications time home. But she's gone now, and _I want to know what happened to her."_ He finished viciously.

Seven, caught off guard by the assertive approach Harry was taking, vulnerable from the accuracy of his historical evidence, and reeling off balance from Harry's appeal to the past Seven of Nine, cracked a little. "Chak – Captain Chakotay and I terminated our affiliation approximately 582 days and 16 hours ago."

_Damn,_ Harry swore, _She's been counting_ hours?_ She's really hurting. _

Seven continued. "214 days and 8 hours ago, Captain Chakotay expressed to Admrial Janeway that he desired to commence a romantic relationship with her. She accepted."

Though Seven's face remained neutral, her eyes couldn't hide the roiling emotions within her. From them Harry discerned the story. As told by the Doctor, almost everyone from Voyager secretly detested the relationship; some thought that it was all a ploy to keep a Captain's affair undercover, others believed that the couple couldn't stand to be in the same room alone together, and still others formed a betting pool on how quickly the relationship would end. Seven felt the opposite, and so while the others must have rejoiced when they disengaged, Seven saw the termination as an insult to trust.

As if paralleling his thoughts, Seven stated, "The memory of his termination of the relationship caused me great emotional trauma. I concluded that if all human relationships ended in such pain, then it would be more beneficial to me to have a life in seclusion than to continue social interaction with humanity and the crew of Voyager in particular."

Harry shook his head in amused disbelief. "Seven," he proclaimed, "You're going about this the wrong way. Instead of giving up, you should try _harder_."

Seven blinked once, most likely astounded that Harry of all people should go up against her conclusions. "Given the evidence arrayed, I cannot see how anything but a tragic end is inevitable."

"But there's no such thing as just one negative conclusion, Seven. A discernable quality that Humanity has always had is hope, the ability to have a positive outlook despite the situation arrayed against us," Harry said passionately. His whole life he believed in looking up no matter what the odds, and he wasn't going to give up now.

But neither was Seven. "It would be a waste of resources and time to go against the inevitable, Lieutanant. And the outcome is far less disappointing if consensus is allowed."

Having faced the inefficiency argument before, Harry countered quickly, "Oh really? Then I'm glad that we've wasted all this 'time and resources.' Without hope, Humanity would have never overcome the disaster of the world wars. Without hope, humanity would never have reached the skies. Without hope, the borg would never have discovered our biological and technological distinctiveness and without hope we would never have beaten them back. But with hope we have beaten back – no, we have _conquered_ the odds, and with hope, anyone can do anything… and that includes finding happiness after 'terminating relations' with their first love."

But Seven, after two years of seclusion, still had fight in her yet. "Based on my observations on the Voyager crew, even you must agree that hope can be counterproductive. You yourself have three failed relationships, fourteen unsuccessful dates, and four negative rumors against you. Those are the 'benefits' of your hope."

Harry was silent, jaw set against the litany displayed in front of him. "It might be true that I've had a long hard road," He said softly, "But I'll never give up the possibility that I can spend the rest of my life completely happy with someone standing by my side, even if that possibility is remote. And in the end," he said, reaching over and taking her hand clasping her right hand in his left, "I'll always have my friends. And so will you."

Seven regarded him with astonished wide eyes at the assertive gesture, and Harry sensed the time was right to ask. "I'm considering going to the Voyager crew Christmas Eve party this year, and I need to prepare by getting gifts for the senior staff." He hesitated for a second. " I can think of no one better than my first officer on the Nightingale to offer me council on which gifts to acquire, so I was wondering if you would like to accompany me Shopping in San Francisco."

So that was it. After finding her, drawing out the story of her seclusion and laying her bare with questions and interrogations, the ultimate goal of the Lieutenant was to coerce her to escort him to the social engagement. Seven's mind processed the outcomes of accepting such a request.

On the beneficial side, she would be able to observe how the Voyager crew was functioning two years after the fact. She was especially keen on seeing her friend Naomi again, and Icheb. Her voluntary confinement, while protecting her from her emotional damaged, also nullified her communication with those she prized most. On the detrimental side, she would firsthand experience the relationship between the Captain and the Admiral, and relive her last encounter with Chakotay with renewed pain. She did not know how she would react in such a situation; she might cause damage to herself and others, and that was a high risk.

In an instant, she had her ultimatum. She was going to refuse, to tell him the time and effort spent looking for items to confer to others was irrelevant and inefficient, to say that he did not respect her wishes to be alone and that this conversation was terminated, and to tear away his hand from hers –

Except that she couldn't. Her body and soul refused to obey her mind, instead relishing in the company that the Lieutenant gave, reveling in the warmth and suppleness of his hand atop hers. On an emotional level, she realized that her being could no longer take the stress of being alone; it craved companionship, and the Lieutenant was offering that freely. It was therefore quite relevant and quite important that she accede to the Lieutenant's requests, he was only providing for her well being, after all.

With that, she concluded that resistance was futile.

To be continued…

Author's Postscript: What did you think? Was it good? Bad? I'll cut you a deal: WRITE ME, AND I'LL MAKE IT EVEN BETTER. And no flames, please; if you say "Harry Kim sux!" (And if you're a RiFter, you shouldn't be saying that), I'd rather much like to hear it in story form than e-mail form.

For you Trek Trivia buffs, the "traechean beast" was mentioned in "Hunters" when Chakotay was commenting on Janeway's condition after getting a dear john letter from Mark. I thought it'd be appropriate for it to be mentioned for Seven and Chakotay's breakup as well. Yeah, yeah, I have a sick sense of humor. Also, they traded jokes on the Delta Flyer in the first five minutes of "Body and Soul" (My favorite K/7 moment of all time), Seven was Harry's second in command in "Nightingale," and she tried giving him her three minutes of communication time in "Author, Author" (Second favorite K/7 moment of all time.) Other references are not relevant enough for me to care to mention them here.

If this seems a little shoddy or something, it's probably because I've written it over the past two weeks, on again off again. I'll try to make sure the rest of the of the fic flows smoothly; it probably will because I'm on a timetable here.

Speaking of timetables, because just this one chapter took two weeks to write, I can't guarantee I'll finish this on the day it's supposed to end, Christmas Eve. It might end on the last of the twelve days; heck, it might end on Valentine's day, who the heck knows. All I can say is if you want to make your own attempts at finishing it, you're welcome to try as long as it's K/7.

Or create your own fic. 'Tis the season to be festive; holiday fanfics are the order of the month. Hopefully, I'll be able to see some of your guy's fics before the season is up. Happy Holidays, and happy writing.


End file.
